Hero Forge will let you 3D print your own characteer

Board games and tabletop games, especially the more complicated ones with hundreds of components and models, can have some beautifully designed units to use on the battlefield, but if you want to customise them, you have to do it yourself. While that's a fun practice for those of us that like working with a Dremel, super glue and modelling putty, it's not necessarily very easy to do and unless you're a skilled sculptor you're still somewhat limited by he parts that you use. Not so with Hero-Force, which lets you 3D print your own custom character.

How custom? Quite a bit actually. There's a large number of poses, weapon choices and armour customisation options and it's all accessible through a web interface that works just like a video game's RPG character creator. Or at least it will do if it passes its Kickstarter. [yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rP5eXV1BsXo']

Along with the choice of components and poses for your character, you'll also get to decide on the material used to make them. The two options are a trade off, one is highly durable but with less detail and has a rougher surface making painting harder, whilst the other has a higher detail finish and is easier to paint, but it's now as strong and is more expensive.

If you want the higher detail material to be used, you're looking to spend around $30 per model (though discounts do apply the more you back the project), whereas the stronger plastic will be more like $20 per model. Either way though, expect your figures to arrive towards the end of the year, with access to the web UI for customising and creating them to come a few months before that if you pledge high enough to get beta and/or alpha access.

There's a couple of stretch goals in place at the moment, which at the pace this project is being backed, seem likely to be breezed past in a few days. They'll give you the option of 3D printing a steed to go with your model and offer up three more races to choose from when creating your character: half Dragon, half Demon and Gnome.

KitGuru Says: This service would be perfect for making custom characters in board games like Descent: Journeys in the dark, or indeed for many tabletop roleplaying games. Here's hoping with newer parts and expansions they'll be able to create some sci-fi alternatives as well. That would open up whole reams of games that these minis could be used for.

[Thanks Kotaku]

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